Mardi Gras 2013 – Scenes from The Krewe of Orpheus

Yesterday, I pelted both citizens and visitors to New Orleans with vast quantities of plastic shiny beads, stuffed plush arrows, light up dinosaurs, glowing bracelets, and what I think was perhaps a flower pinwheel, although I couldn’t really tell.

In truth, like many people attending Mardi Gras, I was not at my sharpest. Before noon, as I suited up to join the Krewe of Orpheus, and boarded the float, I’d been handed a water bottle filled with much gin and a little tonic, as well as fanny pack filled with airplane shots of back up Tanqueray.

That bottle was refilled before the parade began at 6 p.m., and and in that condition, in light drizzle, balancing on thick plastic bags of beads and a lurching float, my never, ever reliable throwing arm launched many, many missile gifts.The photo below is pretty much exactly how the crowd looked to me.

*Many thanks to the W New Orleans in the French Quarter, which is a sister property to the Sheraton which sponsors the Krewe of Orpheus